Eat out: Crop

We have been trying to arrange going to dinner at Crop with John, Mary, Tony, and MaryAnn for MONTHS and our schedules finally aligned and we got to go last night. Crop used to be over on the west side somewhere and moved to a new space at West 25th and Lorain right across the street from the West Side Market this fall. The space used to be a bank built in the 1920’s and they rehabbed the space beautifully. Huge ornate ceiling, huge restored mural behind the bar and rehabbed marble that they used everywhere. It is quite impressive. We had a great dinner as well. I had some sort of Manhattan that they have on their cocktail menu that was delecious – especially the liquor soaked cherries that came with it. We started dinner with an amuse bouche of raw tuna with a piece of roasted tomato in a vinagrette. We split 4 appetizers among us: balsamic popcorn, cherry bomb, calamari and the soft shelled crab which was the app special of the evening. They were all excellent – especially the cherry bomb which was a cherry tomato, stuffed with chorizo sausage, wrapped in wonton and deep fried; also the soft shell crab was super fresh, tender and tasty. All our entrees were great. I had veal shanks which came with white beans and olives. Very tender and delecious. Courtney has the fish special of the evening – some kind of Hawaiian fish that I don’t remember the name of but was really good, served over a black rice pilaf. We split a chocolate pretzel moussey cake desert as well as some pastries that were like homemade pop tarts. After the meal we were given a tour of the old bank vault in the basement that you can rent out for parties. Very cool. Great place. I can’t wait to go back.

Eat on Edgecliff Rating: A- (The minus is only because they put TVs on the wall in the bar…sorry John)

beautifully restored ceilingthe bar with the mural behind itthe open kitchen with beautiful white marble that is all over the restaurant.the bank vault party room